


My Upright and Experimental Child

by BrighteyedJill



Series: The Only Animal [2]
Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: HYDRA Trash Party, M/M, Multi, Nightmares, Past Rape/Non-con, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Recovery, poly love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-10
Updated: 2017-01-10
Packaged: 2018-09-16 12:27:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 843
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9271406
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BrighteyedJill/pseuds/BrighteyedJill
Summary: Years later, it still catches up with him sometimes. But he-- they-- all of them together-- know what to do.





	

**Author's Note:**

> This is the micro recovery fic I wrote a while back when I/others were just too darn depressed by the ending of The Only Animal. I kept telling people that in 70-100 years, things would get better!
> 
> Also yes, the title is from the same poem.

Bucky dropped to a crouch on the floor with his left hand straight out in front of him to ward off attack. He wasn’t fully awake until the nightstand lamp snapped on, illuminating the tangle of sheets and pillows on the long, flat expanse of the bed, and Sam’s bare skin, dark in the warm glow. 

“Hey.” Sam blinked against the weight of sleep. When he caught sight of Bucky, he pushed himself up to sitting. He might move more slowly than he used to—the bad shoulder bothered him more at night—but he still showed an uncanny ability to recognize an emergency and see how to deal with it. “Buck? You with me?”

Bucky fixed his eyes on Sam’s face and breathed in through his nose and out through his mouth three times. He let his muscles relax, dropping out of combat readiness until he knelt with his head hanging, counting out an appropriate heart rate. Familiar, routine, soothing. When he looked up, Sam held out his hand. 

Bucky reached up and let himself be pulled back under the covers. After dozens or maybe hundreds of iterations, Sam knew what Bucky needed now. He wrapped his strong arms around Bucky and held on tight enough to make breathing a challenge. After a few minutes, the tension from the adrenaline rush had melted away, leaving Bucky boneless and pliant. 

“Ready?” Sam asked eventually.

In answer, Bucky turned over in the ring of Sam’s arms and searched Sam’s face. His hair had started to acquire salt and pepper specks in the past few years, and the scar from that wreck of a mission in Bogota was still visible as a pale line across his right eyebrow and over his cheekbone. Steve hadn’t changed, or only as much as Bucky’s own reflection had, but seeing Sam always helped Bucky remember where he was-- _when_ he was. He tucked his head under Sam’s chin and muttered, “I had a nightmare,” against his chest. 

“Something real, or…?”

“Yeah, I think so.” Bucky had felt the cold tile under his knees, smelled hot metal and the copper tang of blood, tasted the acrid stickiness of come on his tongue. His imagination had never been as good at manufacturing those details as his memory was at dredging up old horrors. He squeezed his eyes closed as his mind skittered away from what he’d seen. “I couldn’t… I didn’t…”

“I know.” Sam pressed his nose into Bucky’s hair, and Bucky could feel his breath huffing against the loose strands. “I know, Buck. I’m here.”

And he did know, all of it. Sam and Steve had both seen Müller’s painfully detailed records, which Bucky had brought to them when he turned himself in. They’d also listened to his first-hand account, delivered in the Winter Soldier’s flat, emotionless voice. Bucky hadn’t wanted to sway them with pity. He needed them to understand what he’d done. 

Sam had asked a few questions. Steve had asked a few more. Bucky had waited for their judgment. He’d prepared himself for it. That was why he’d finally decided to stop, after months of evading their pursuit. But the judgment had never come. Not then, and not in the long years since.

One of Sam’s hands loosened its hold on Bucky to stroke down his back, then trace the line of his shoulder where metal met flesh. “You still with me?” he asked. 

“Yeah.” Bucky breathed in through his nose, out through his mouth. In. Out. “Yeah.”

“You want to tell me?” Sam waited, letting his fingers move back and forth over Bucky’s skin. When no answer came, he tried again. “Or you want me to tell you?”

Usually, Bucky was better at this. He could hold on to his hard-won progress and even in the dark, even when he was alone, he could remember what he really believed. But Steve had been gone almost a week, and Bucky’s dream had been full of Müller’s unrelenting Cheshire-cat grin, and Sam was right here: warm and alive and not running. “Don’t make me choose,” Bucky whispered. 

“Okay. I’ll tell you.” Sam settled Bucky more firmly in his arms and bowed his head. “It wasn’t your fault,” he said as Bucky mouthed along with the words, a well-known prayer. “You did the best you could. You didn’t deserve what happened. Your judgment is trustworthy, and you make good decisions. You are worthy of love. You are loved.” He pressed a kiss into Bucky’s hair. “And I love you.”

Bucky tried to draw breath to respond, to tell Sam he loved him, too, that he was so much better than what Bucky deserved, but his voice caught on a muffled sob.

“I’m here,” Sam repeated, as he had so many other nights. “I’m not going anywhere.”

Bucky concentrated on the feel of Sam’s arms around him as his breath heaved in his chest, then evened out, then became smooth and steady. When he finally drifted off to sleep, safe in the circle of Sam’s arms, he did not dream.


End file.
